CONDOLEEZZA RICE will arrive in Jerusalem today on a mission to end the intensifying conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, as Syria indicated for the first time that it was prepared to intervene.

 
 
As the US Secretary of State prepared to set out the American plan for ending the fighting - persuading Arab allies to isolate Syria and stop it from arming and funding Hezbollah - Israel said that it would agree to the deployment of a Nato force in southern Lebanon to keep guerrillas from attacking the border. After meetings today with Ehud Olmert, the Israeli Prime Minister, and tomorrow with Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian President, Dr Rice will travel to an emergency conference in Rome on Wednesday, attended by officials from Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the EU and the UN.

Dr Rice left Washington yesterday amid increasing condemnation from the UN and Britain over the scale of the Israeli bombardment of Lebanon. Criticism is likely to mount after the US was forced to admit that it was expediting the delivery of 5,000lb laser-guided "bunker buster" bombs to Israel under an agreement reached between the two countries last year.

With the US ruling out direct talks with Syria and Hezbollah, and with Arab allies refusing to host the emergency meeting because of the White House's rejection of an immediate ceasefire, Dr Rice arrives in the region at a time of intense distrust of American motives. She is almost wholly reliant on Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Jordan to pressure Damascus into disarming Hezbollah.

As she left Dr Rice said that there was "no quick fix" and that diplomacy would be difficult.

In a sign that Syria might be feeling the pressure from its Arab neighbours, Faisal al-Meqdad, its Deputy Foreign Minister, said Damascus was willing to have direct talks with the US to resolve the conflict.

That reconciliatory tone was countered, however, by Mohsen Bilal, the country's Information Minister, who said that Syria would enter the conflict if the Israelis invaded Lebanon. "If Israel makes a land invasion of Lebanon and gets near us, Syria will not stand by with arms folded," he told the Spanish newspaper ABC. "It will enter the conflict.” He added that Syria would only co-operate with peace negotiations within the framework of a broader Middle East peace initiative that would include the return to Syria of the Golan Heights, captured by Israel in 1967.

John Bolton, the US Ambassador to the UN, rebuffed Syria’s offer to help to broker a peace deal. “Syria doesn’t need dialogue to know what they need to do,” he said. He repeated Dr Rice’s assertion that there would be no solution to the conflict until Hezbollah had been disarmed.

The diplomatic activity came after another day of violence. Israeli airstrikes in Beirut and east and south Lebanon killed six people and wounded 80, and Hezbollah rockets killed two and wounded 15 in Haifa. Jan Egeland, the UN’s head of emergency relief, called the Israeli bombardment a “violation of humanitarian law”.

Since the conflict began 12 days ago at least 365 people have died in Lebanon and 37 in Israel. Yesterday the Israeli military said that it had forced out Hezbollah guerrillas from the village of Maroun al-Ras, just inside Lebanon, where six Israeli commandos have been killed this week. Two Hezbollah fighters were captured.

Amir Peretz, the Israeli Defence Minister, said that his country would agree to the deployment of a Nato force in southern Lebanon because of the “weakness of the Lebanese Army”. His statement was the clearest indication yet of a tentative plan for withdrawal from Lebanon.

timesonline.co.uk